Matthew 16:16-18

16:16 Simon Peter answered, ¹  “You are the Christ, ²  the Son of the living God.” 16:17 And Jesus answered him, ³  “You are blessed, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood ⁴  did not reveal this to you, but my Father in heaven! 16:18 And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades ⁵  will not overpower it.

¹ tn Grk “And answering, Simon Peter said.”

² tn Or “Messiah”; both “Christ” (Greek) and “Messiah” (Hebrew and Aramaic) mean “one who has been anointed.”

³ tn Grk “answering, Jesus said to him.” The participle ἀποκριθείς (apokriqeis) is redundant, but the syntax of this phrase has been modified for clarity.

⁴ tn The expression “flesh and blood” could refer to “any human being” (so TEV, NLT; cf. NIV “man”), but it could also refer to Peter himself (i.e., his own intuition; cf. CEV “You didn’t discover this on your own”). Because of the ambiguity of the referent, the phrase “flesh and blood” has been retained in the translation.

⁵ tn Or “and the power of death” (taking the reference to the gates of Hades as a metonymy).